Elle m'a aimé
by Huricain
Summary: Percy held up his fingers to count, just to make sure. "That means…" Annabeth looked like she was about to cry. Her baby- their baby, hugged her neck. Annabeth nodded, "We should talk." Percy left for Boston two years ago so Annabeth could continue her career. He comes back to everything he ever wanted, except its all just out of his reach. Percabeth
1. Chapter 1

**The title and whole basis of the story is from Kendji Girac's Elle M'a aimé (She Loved Me). **

Percy left in the afternoon. He made up his mind at work and drove from there to Boston and bought seven nights at a run-down motel that at one point was probably called "Old North Church Motel" but the only working lighting renamed it "Ol Nor uch Mtel." It wasn't nearly as nice as his tiny cabinet of an apartment back in New York with Annabeth, and the sheets were super scratchy, but it was enough.

He had stopped by their apartment before he took off and left her a note on the dinner table. He hoped she'd understand. Him leaving really was for the best, she'd realize that eventually. He was just too much of a coward to face her.

A peaceful sleep was hard to come by that night. And every night afterwards. Every time he closed his eyes he saw her. Most of the time she was smiling at him, which was pretty much worse than the image of her screaming and yelling. It was like Morpheus was conspiring with Aphrodite to remind him of what he left behind.

_They were walking down the boardwalk on Coney Island. It was the most cliche date; they had spent the day at the carnival, stuffed themselves with fried Oreos and funnel cake, and were having ice cream for dinner. He had gotten the cotton candy flavor, and it was quickly turning his lips, teeth, and tongue blue. She had gotten turtle turds, or something like that. It was ridiculous, because Ice cream is supposed to be soft and creamy and putting hard peanut butter cups in it defeats the whole purpose of ice _cream_. Also, it was brown and white. How _unappetizing.

_But even if her ice cream was gross, his wasn't. He was having a great time. But nothing could compare to how delicious she looked in the setting sun's golden rays. Paired with the glittering Atlantic, she looked like she stepped out from a dream. He said something to make her laugh, and her cheeks stretched back and her tongue stuck out from her teeth just the tiniest bit._

_He was so in love._

_She licked her ice cream and pointed at something in the distance. He didn't know what it was, he couldn't bear to take his eyes off of her. She said his name and turned to look at him, confused as to why he didn't answer. She laughed again at his face. He probably had the derpiest smile on, but he couldn't bring himself to care. There were more important things to pay attention to, like how her hair turned yellow-gold in the sun and the grey in her eyes was so light it reflected the Atlantic, turning her irises a cool blue. She had a freckle on her left cheekbone that was darker than usual from days sprawled out under the American summer sun. _

_They were both barefoot; he was carrying their shoes. Her tan legs seemed unending under her white summer dress and her curls, a tangled salty mess, blew around her neck and back. _

_Percy couldn't wait for the day she wore white and walked down an aisle toward him._

_She laughed again and tried to stretch her right arm around his shoulders, getting on her tiptoes and still not being able to reach. He slipped his left arm, the one holding his ice cream, around her waist to get her stead when she stumbled a bit on her toes. She laughed again, throwing her head back this time. Percy couldn't help it. He leaned down and planted tiny kisses all over her face. Her forehead, her eyebrows, her chin, the side of her mouth (and with it a little bit of her toothy smile), the part where her nose met the rest of her face, her eyes, everywhere. _

"_I love you," he told her, slowing down on his kisses._

"_I love you, too," she replied. He shook his head and continued to kiss her. _

He didn't have any contact with her. He hadn't told her where he was going. Hell, when he left _he _didn't know where he was going. He left his cell at their place, wrote down all the necessary contacts, like his mother and physician and favorite taco place in the Bronx and his car insurance dude, and put them all on a burner phone he bought after his first night in Boston. He smiled humorlessly at the thought that was behaving an awful lot like the fugitives in those True Crime shows she loved to watch.

His boss had given him a job with the animals down in Boston Harbor. It wasn't really a surprise. His boss had brought it up to him a couple of times prior. That was the first time he had thought about leaving. He had watched his job become increasingly taxing, with an oil spill down in New Jersey that spread into the Hudson. His commute had gotten longer, too. They moved out to Long Island City so Annabeth could be closer to her office, since she walked, but that also meant they were farther from the Hudson. And since the spill was just north of Staten Island, his commute was further south than usual. He was spending literally hours on the subway every day.

And, since they had pretty recently moved into an only slightly larger apartment, they were still lacking some furniture and the whole house still needed to be deep cleaned. Also, when he left, Annabeth had started complaining about the water in the kitchen sink not working properly. Usually, he was the one that deep cleaned the house (she organized it). She had tried to stay up for him when he began working late, and Percy knew that she had cleaned the house in an attempt to keep herself awake. Thankfully she hadn't touched the pipes in the kitchen. She may have been an architect with a basic understanding of how utility systems worked, but as a general rule, she did what she wanted in her work and let the engineers bitch about how her blueprints were incompatible with their systems. Plus, Percy was just better at anything that had to do with water, even with thick metal between him and the water.

Annabeth understood why he was working longer days, he knew she did, but that didn't make him feel less guilty as he watched her struggle to do the laundry he usually did or noticed the overwhelming amount of leftovers piling up in the fridge.

He told her his feelings of guilt and incompetency.

"It's just for a little while. You gotta go save the ocean, wonder boy, I get it. Things will be back to normal when this is all over. We're just going through a rough patch, that's all," she had smiled at him and then turned back to her blueprints.

Except it wasn't just a rough patch. Oil spills take a long time to clean up and rehabilitating the animals takes even longer. And with her being the only one doing work on the apartment it was taking twice as long to settle in.

And the cherry on top was that Annabeth was starting to get sick. Like, puking her guts out all the time sick. And she had to pee _a lot_.

Percy was supposed to go with her to the doctor's, but he got a call about a harbor seal while on the subway.

Percy wasn't stupid. He knew she was getting sick from too much stress. And that he was the reason for her stress. She was basically doing double the housework she usually did and getting less sleep trying to wait up for him. He tried to convince her not to, but she was stubborn as a mule. He was 110% the reason she was sick and stressed. And she didn't even let him feel guilty or get angry with him ask him to try to spend more time home or ask him to fold a load of laundry for her. She just left a pot of whatever she had made that night on the counter and the lamp in the living room on.

_He tried to step into the apartment quietly, but while trying to take off his scarf and coat at the same time he tripped over either his scarf or his own feet. He caught himself before he could get hurt, but probably woke up the entire floor below them in the process._

_Throwing his coat and the scarf over the side of the couch he made his way to the kitchen, packing up the chicken and rice she left out for him. He had bought a hotdog while on his way to the subway. Plus, it was close to midnight, and his stomach hurt if he ate right before bed. _

_He thought about just stripping and crashing into bed without taking a shower, but then he remembered the sticky thing his hand touched while on the subway and decided a shower sounded really good. _

_He brushed his teeth in the shower, trying to cut down the time he spent out of his bed. He hung his towel up and threw on a pair of boxers and made his way toward the bed. The floorboards right outside their bathroom had water damage to them and squeaked if stepped on, so he lunged over them in an attempt to minimize his nose making. Not that it made much difference; he already tripped over himself, cursed very loudly at the water's heat, and stubbed his toe on the shower doorway. _

_He pulled the covers on his side down very gently, trying not to take any off Annabeth's body. He thought he had done really well until he heard her sigh and felt her turn toward him._

"_Hi," she slurred without opening her eyes._

_He smiled down at her, "Good morning."_

"_Morning?" She pulled her eyebrows together in confusion but still didn't open her eyes._

"_Just after midnight," he whispered._

_She nodded and curled up to his side, using his bare chest as a pillow. _

_He started to rub her back rhythmically and was almost asleep when he heard her say his name._

"_Percy?"_

_He hummed in response._

"_Do you want a boy or a girl?"_

_Oh shit._

_She sat up and leaned over him, her curls whispering over his skin and tickling his neck. So she obviously wasn't ready to go to sleep._

"_Like, when we have a baby. Do you even want a baby? With me?"_

_Percy turned to her. "Of course I want a baby with you. I want multiple babies with you. I want a whole football team of babies, my love. Where did this come from? Do you have something you wanna tell me?" He laughed a little. _

_She resituated herself. _

"_Well," she started, "one of my coworkers came back from maternity leave, and she was showing everybody pictures of her new baby boy, and I was thinking, I want a baby boy."_

_Percy nodded, "Okay, what about a little girl?"_

_She shook her head, "No," she answered firmly. "I didn't have a mom growing up, or really any strong female figure in my girlhood. I'm afraid that I just won't be able to raise a little girl or make her into a strong woman, like your mom, you know? Plus, like, everybody says boys are easier. I can play rough with them and cheer them on at sports games and I don't have to walk them through periods or bra shopping and all the stuff mothers should do with their daughters."_

_Percy waited for a moment to make sure she was finished. _

"_But that's why you'll be such a great mom. You're starting off on a blank slate, you have no one to compare yourself to. Plus, you've learned what not to do from your mom, right?" _

_Annabeth gave him a look that would have been scary if she wasn't still so sleepy._

"_I could have figured out that abandoning your kid was a bad parenting move without a real-life reenactment."_

_Percy laughed under his breath and pulled her close to him. _

"_Think about it, baby. You remember all the questions you had as a kid, yeah?"_

_She nodded and whispered, "Yeah."_

"_And if you had those memories with someone else all you would have remembered would be whatever your mom said, not what you thought or felt. So you basically have a leg up in the mom-game, 'cuz you'll know what she's feeling more than someone who just remembered what their mom said and did," he glanced down at her. She was staring at their wall, a faraway look in her eyes. _

"_Yeah," she whispered again. _

_He resituated himself under her and closed his eyes._

"'_Sides," he slurred, "I don't care what we have. I just want my baby to have your eyes."_

_He felt her head turn to look up at him._

"_No," he could hear the frown in her voice and pictured her whole face pulled down and her bottom lip pushed out, like how she does when she doesn't like what he just said or did, "I want them to have your eyes." _

_He smiled and shook his head._

"_I want a baby boy with your eyes and I want to name him Leviathan, like the sea monster in the Hebrew Bible, and call him Levi."_

_It was his turn to frown and look at her, "You want to name our baby after a sea monster?"_

_She nodded and grinned, "Yeah, I think it's pretty fitting, don't you?"_

_He laughed and put his head back. _

"_If we have a boy I'd like to name him Aaron. My mother's uncle, the one she grew up with, died from cancer when she was nineteen? His name was Aaron."_

_Annabeth was silent for a moment._

"_Okay, yeah, maybe you have a better reason for your name."_

_They were quiet for a moment._

"_If we have a girl," he started. She raised her head to look at him._

"_I want her to look just like you, and name her Vivian, that way when she's little we can call her Vivi and when she's older she can go by her full name. "_

"_Vivian means life," she told him. _

"_Oh, so you've been thinking about this," he raised his eyebrows. _

_She laid back down on his chest. "I like Milan, and call her Mila, or Sienna."_

"_Why do you wanna name our baby after cities in Italy? We're Greek."_

"_I'm Swedish."_

"_Whatever."_

_She rolled her eyes at him._

"_I like Esmerelda if she has your eyes, but I don't want people to call her Essie or Elda."_

"_We could call her Mere," he offered._

_She thought about it for a little while. "I like it, but I'm afraid it sounds too much like merde, the french word for shit, and then she'd get teased."_

"_I think you're overthinking this," he told her. _

"_Probably." She sounded halfway to dreamland, and with the way she was tracing the tattoos on his arms, he was quickly falling asleep as well. _

Percy settled into Boston rather nicely, considering he had just left the love of his life. He bought a teeny tiny apartment by the harbor. Boston wasn't crazy different from New York. There were still tourists milling around and skyscrapers everywhere, even if it was slightly less condensed, and there didn't seem to be as many Lithuanian restaurants, and there was no Annabeth in Boston. He remembered she had a cousin in Boston, but if she came to visit the cousin in the time he lived in Boston, he didn't cross paths with her. He went up to visit his mother in New York a few times, too, but his mother still lived in Manhattan, across the river from the apartment he and Annabeth had shared. He walked by the apartment complex a couple of times, but he never saw her. He wasn't sure if he was hoping to see her or not.

Bachelor life was...different. He and Annabeth had been together since they were teenagers, and it struck him when he signed the lease to his Bostonian apartment that he literally couldn't remember when he lived without her. He didn't really like the feeling he felt in his stomach when he slept alone in the empty apartment.

When he and Annabeth were together he had prided himself on being the one to clean the house. He felt like a good feminist taking care of the house and not needing to come home to a housewife that did all his cooking and cleaning for him. Not that Annabeth would ever let herself be a housewife. But he still felt like he was making a small contribution to the equal rights movement. Except, somehow it slipped his mind that because he literally never lived without either his mom or Annabeth he also literally never had to cook for himself. He thought he could cook, because he could bake, but as it turns out they are not the same. Cooking requires spicing and simmering and boiling and something called sauteing.

He ate a lot of takeout. But he did vacuum his bachelor pad every week, so he wasn't completely hopeless.

So consistently alone with his thoughts, memories of her danced around in his head. One of his favorites was when he had been folding clothes in their room and she was on the couch in their living room.

"_Baby!" She called, "Baby! I need you!"_

"_What?" he asked, still folding one of her shirts in his hand. _

"_I need you," she said in a quieter voice. _

"_I'm right here."_

"_No," she held her arms out, "I need you _here_."_

_He laughed and threw the shirt on the coffee table in front of her, crashing onto the couch and into her arms. _

_His bare foot hit something hard and he noticed that she had thrown the book she had been reading to the opposite end of the couch._

"Ah," _he thought, "_that's what this is."

_He smiled sympathetically at her, "Your book break your heart again?"_

_She nodded from underneath him. _

"_Oh my god, Percy, the main girl was supposed to fall in love with the prince and make him a better man and they would live happily together forever, but then the author made the main girl go on a trip with the prince's best friend, who's a total perv and an ass, and then the prince goes with his ex to look for the main girl and his best friend, and, mind you, the ex didn't come into the picture until, like, chapter 36, and then the prince and his ex start to, like, re-fall in love, and the main girl and the prince's pervy best friend start to fall in love and it's just not going the way I want it to and now I don't wanna have to suffer through having to read about the two totally incompatible couples but also I have to know if the revolt they're traveling to quell is even happening and if it is whose side everybody is on but I don't want to, because then I have to read about the main girl and prince's pervy friend, and the prince and his poorly-developed ex!" She paused to catch her breath._

_Again, Percy looked at her sympathetically._

"_Maybe this is just part of the plot? You're not done with the book yet, maybe they'll all fall in love with the right people in the end," he offered._

"_No, baby, nobody makes a love rectangle like that."_

_He laughed. "Well, if it makes you feel any better," he started, "I will never fall in love with anyone but my princess, and certainly not one of my exes."_

_She tucked a curl behind her ear, "I didn't ask about you, Perce."_

"_I'm trying to make you happy."_

"_Also, you don't have any exes," she continued as if he hadn't said anything._

"_Yes, I do!"_

"_Who?" _

"_Chelsea Peters, from, like, sophomore year of high school, and Maisie Haven was my girlfriend in middle school."_

_She scoffed, "They wouldn't wanna get back with you anyways."_

"_They'd love to have a piece of this," he started to roll his hips against hers in what was supposed to be a sensual way, but was really more painful and unrhythmic. _

"_Ouch, bro, you're crushing me!"_

_He looked down, "I'm barely on y- hey, is that my shirt?"_

"_Yeah."_

"_I'm literally in the middle of doing the laundry."_

"_Yeah, this one's clean, I took it out of the dryer."_

"_But now you're getting it dirty again."_

"_I'm literally just sitting here."_

"_Yeah, sitting here getting your girl cooties all over my shirt."_

_She rolled her eyes, "Yeah, I'm sure Chello and Maize are both dying to get back with you."_

"_Chello and Mai- oh, Chelsea and Maisie."_

"_I don't know why you still remember their names, it's not like they're important or some shit."_

Percy didn't date while in Boston. He was using that time in Massachusetts to _find himself_. Also to rethink his life. People had always told him in high school that he and Annabeth wouldn't last, that young love only feels that idyllic because it's their first love and one day they'd move on with their lives, hopefully look back on the time they spent together with a fond smile, and go their separate ways. Which, was obviously true on a superficial level, but Percy never really stopped loving Annabeth. Yeah, they didn't last, but that was because she was so incredibly angelic and flawless and patient and so ridiculously smart and so full of potential and just all around _perfect _and he just wasn't _good enough _for her that he was holding her back, so he had to leave her. That's what love is, right? Wanting the person you love to be happy and successful and to flourish and bloom even without you or at the expense of your own happiness.

The difference between his life with Annabeth and his life in MA was so starkly different sometimes it gave him whiplash just thinking about it. He had mixed feelings about it. With Annabeth, he had to text her when he got to work, call her when he was leaving, tell her where he was going if he wasn't going to be home at his usual time. He had to plan dates and buy expensive dinners and go with her to her father's cousin's daughter's wedding. He had to talk with her before buying a new TV subscription and couldn't leave his shoes in the doorway. Now he could so out drinking with his buddies without having to report to anyone and he could eat pizza for dinner _every single night. _He could buy a cake from the store for no particular reason and eat it all in one sitting with no one to question him. He didn't have to spend money on fancy towels or nice soaps he could never use.

But parts of his soul were missing, too. There was nobody to wake up next to in the morning and no one to binge watch CSI with and no one to cuddle after he had a bad day. There was no one blasting music on Sunday mornings and no one to use as an excuse to not go to functions. There was no one to poke him while he tried to take a nap and no one to go grocery shopping with. There was no one to eat the cherry jelly beans and no one to dance with while he was drunk off tequila at 2 a.m. There was no one to make homemade pizzas with. There was no one to do weird face masks with and no one to sit on the toilet and talk about his day with him while he was in the shower. There were no pencil skirts over the back of the couch and no documentaries filling up his Netflix account and no half-drunk cups of tea on every surface imaginable. There was no one to talk about dinosaurs with at midnight and no one to tell him his breath smelled like New York harbor in the mornings and no one to try and put his hair in a man-bun. There was no makeup sprawled on the floor in front of their full-body mirror and no fancy hair masks in his shower.

Being single came with newfound freedom and independence, but he really missed the pieces of heaven only he and Annabeth shared.

_She was sitting at the kitchen table making arrangements for the wedding. He had just woken up from a nap. He had that weird taste in his mouth that you get after sleeping too hard, like a wad of stinky cotton was filling up his mouth. He wanted a Coke and Annabeth. Quiet Swedish music was floating around her and he could smell grilled cheese and tomato soup on the stove. _

"_Oh, hey, you're up," she looked up at him. _

_He yawned and nodded. _

"_Come look at these and tell me which arrangement you like better," she commanded._

_He nodded from his place at the fridge, popping open the can and taking a sip before walking over to her. He peered over her shoulder at two photos on her hands. _

"_Do you like the one with the calla lilies or the daisies?"_

"_I thought we were gonna do the blue hibiscus flowers, like the one in your tattoo?" He looked back at her. _

_She nodded, "Yeah, those are going in my bouquet, but they're too expensive to use as table decorations. I may add in a couple, depending on the final price and if we have anything left over in our budget."_

_Percy nodded and then shrugged._

"_I don't care, whichever one goes best with the hibiscuseseses," he drew out. _

_She nodded, oblivious to his joke in concentration. "I think the calla lilies would go best, there more harmony in the soft edges of those than the triangular daisies."_

_She set the photos down and reached for her computer but Percy grabbed her hands before they could touch it. _

_He glanced at the clock, "Have you been working on this all afternoon?"_

_She shook her head, "No, just since you went to sleep."_

"_So...all afternoon?"_

_She laughed and nodded a little._

"_You're gonna mess up your sleep schedule," she told him._

_He rolled his eyes, "Like you don't keep me up every night until you're satisfied."_

_She laughed again and stood up, hugging him, "I let you have your fun, too. Don't make me sound so selfish."_

"_Mmm, you're not selfish as much as you are greedy."_

_Her mouth made a little 'o' and her face tried to scrunch up in a scowl that was ruined by her smile. _

_He laughed and kissed her eyes, "Dance with me?"_

_He started rocking them back and forth as she smiled and shook her head, leaning int him even more._

"_I got shit to do," she told him, but made no move to get out of his embrace. _

_He snorted, "Yeah, me, I'm the shit you need to do. C'mon, my angel, take a break for just a minute."_

_She nodded and leaned into him as he spun them around a couple of times. He started to quietly sing along to her music, except he didn't know Swedish, so he just came up with the closest English word and sang that. She grinned up at him and rested her chin on his chest. _

_Her curls were a tangled mess of golden sunlight, and Percy couldn't believe this personification of perfection wanted to be with _him_, be in _his _arms, marry _him_, start a family with _him. _He must have been a superhero in his previous life to deserve her. _

_They danced around their tiny kitchen, laughing as they bumped into countertops and whispering sweet nothings into each other's skin. Percy reached up to hold the back of her head in his hand, closing his eyes with a blissful smile on his face._

Percy was going back to New York. It had been two years, and he was tired of soul searching. Plus, his company had opened up another center and Percy had been asked to help with the startup. Percy was only a little bitter that he had _just _gotten his Massachusetts license in the mail, but as it turns out driving is not as exhilarating as he had anticipated. It was mostly just being confused about the rules and signs while people honked at you.

This new center was farther north than his previous New York center, so he was staying just a couple blocks from his mom, on the Manhattan side of the East River. Communication between him and his mother had been sparse. He still loved her dearly, but along with her having a ten-year-old and living in another state, she always wanted to talk about how Annabeth was doing. Surprisingly, it was better to hear about her on the bad days. It felt good to know that she had been promoted and was doing well. If she moved on or had any other boyfriends, his mother didn't tell him. Actually, more than status updates, he got a lot of begging from his mom for him to talk to her, call her, send her a card. She said Annabeth needed him, that he shouldn't have made such a rash decision, that they needed to work things out together. His mom was really banking on Annabeth being her daughter-in-law and the mother of her grandkids. Percy didn't know how to tell the woman who gave him life that he hadn't done enough with his to be worthy of being in Annabeth's.

He spent a lot of time at his mom's apartment, catching up with her and Paul and playing with Stella. He really missed his family, and maybe he should have thought about the consequences of his decisions before running off to Boston. Stella had missed her big brother a lot.

A lot of things had changed, but a lot of things had stayed the same. Like, instead of soccer and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Stella was interested in lacrosse and boys. Mom had turned a spare room in the apartment into an office for her writing. Paul's school switched to an online grading system, but he still used his old fashioned grade book. Their cat, Isabella, was still fat, and there were an excessive amount of old people living on the second floor of their building, which Percy thought was stupid because if _he _was older than sliced bread he wouldn't want to take the stairs every time he had to get in or out of his house.

He was thinking about the absurdity of it all when he saw her again.

She had a different haircut, a little shorter and with more layers. Her face looked more angular, like it had lost the rest of its baby fat. She had hoops and diamond in her ears, a necklace on that spelled out a name, and a large ring on her middle finger, and a diamond one on her left ring finger. She wasn't dressed in anything fancy or even really nice, just tennis shoes, plain black leggings, and an oversized Nike tee. She was carrying a large blue backpack and a different purse than the one she had when he left for Boston. But the most surprising thing she was carrying was a little girl.

She was wearing a pale pink shirt and white baby leggings and had a mass of dark curls pulled back in two braids. She looked no older than a year and a half. Since she was so young she didn't have any definite facial features, but Percy could tell she was Annabeth's baby girl right away. They had the same sparkling grey eyes. Even if they didn't have the same eyes, anyone could have recognized they were mother and daughter from the way Annabeth was cooing at her and the way her baby was handing on to her and smiling.

Percy wasn't stupid. Less than eighteen months old meant that she had to be born only months after he left. Perhaps Annabeth had gone out after he left, full of hurt and anger, and had a one night stand, the resulting being the baby in her arms. Maybe the dad was still in their lives. Maybe she loved her baby's father with all her heart. Maybe she and the father were going to get married in the spring and have even more beautiful baby girls.

He entertained the thought for a minute that the father had walked out, or didn't know, or both, but quickly threw the thought away. He knew first hand how hard it was to leave Annabeth. Plus, with two girls as magnificent as the ones walking toward him, whoever had swooped in to save the day after he left had a perfect life.

Percy went through a lot of emotions very fast. At first, it was anger, because _he _was going to marry Annabeth, _he _was going to be the father of Annabeth's child, and all the children she had after that. She was going to design a house for them to live in _together_ and they would move out to the suburbs with their basketball team of children and they would grow old _together _and life would be _perfect _because he had Annabeth to fall asleep next to every night and their children to wake them up every morning. She was supposed to be Analiese Bethel Chase Jackson and her initials would be ABCJ and he would call her AJ and her children would have his last name because _he_ was supposed to be Annabeth's person forever.

Then he felt guilty because _he _had walked out of her life and no where in the rules of life did it say that she was supposed to wait around for him to get his shit together and he wasn't fucking _entitled _to her. He had forfeited his privilege to be in her life the moment he merged onto the highway that took him to Boston.

The most overwhelming feeling he felt was regret. He _could have been_ the one to marry Annabeth, he _could have been _the father of her children, he _could have had _the life they had planned together if he just _talked to her. _If he had just _communicated _with her and articulated his feelings like the 25 year old man he was when he left then he wouldn't have been too late. The ring on her finger could have been the one he gave her and the baby in her arms could have been his. And it almost was if he wasn't so damn _rash_ and _stupid _and threw it all away because he thought he knew best.

He realized that he had stopped in his shock and was standing near the stairwell his mother's apartment complex. She hadn't seen him, hadn't recognized him, and she was walking toward the doors to the complex. She was pulling open the doors to the complex and her baby was laughing and she was struggling to get the door opened wide enough for the big backpack to fit through. The doorman saw her struggling and reached over to help. She smiled and thanked him in a soft voice and nodded her head.

Did she live here now? Is this where her fiance lived? Her baby's father? Was she visiting a friend? What are the odds that he would see her again just _weeks _after moving back to New York?

The stairwell was right next to the two elevators. She was walking toward one of them. She still hadn't noticed him. She pressed the _up_ button on the elevator and stepped back to wait. Her baby was holding a Dory stuffed animal. The baby threw it down in Percy's direction, giggling with glee as he mother reprimanded her and leaned down to pick it up. Her hands wer too full. Her purse fell from her shoulder as she leaned to pick the toy up and she wobbled for a minute, thrown off balance by the purse falling.

Percy didn't think much about it until he was holding the stuffed animal up to her baby's face and had a hand on Annabeth's back, stabilizing her.

Annabeth stared at him as he handed the toy back to her daughter.

"Here you go, darling," he tried to say. The words came out a gravelly whispered mess.

The girl smiled and took the toy, making Dory swim around into Annabeth's hair.

They stood up together.

Percy swallowed and watched the baby girl. Annabeth watched him.

Annabeth's baby looked back at him curiously, probably wondering why he was still standing so close to her mother. The baby stopped playing and rested her head on Annabeth's shoulder, staring curiously at Percy with big beautiful grey eyes surrounded by long black lashes.

"She's your's," he said. It wasn't a question.

She nodded. Then seemed to shake herself out of her stupor.

"Yes, um, she is. Her name is Vivian, we call her Vivi," she glanced down at the floor in a nervous manner, "for now, at least."

Percy nodded.

"Um, how old is she?'

Annabeth bit her lip and shuffled her feet a little, reaching up to tug on the strand of hair falling in her face just like she used to do when she was nervous.

"She turned eighteen months on the 24th," Annabeth told him.

Eighteen months on September 24th. She was born in February of last year. Percy had left in early August the year before Vivi was born.

Percy wasn't really good at math, so he had to do the problem over in his head a couple times. Annabeth had to have been pregnant before he left. Not only that but she had to have been around five months along, and even if the baby was born premature there was no way the healthy little girl sitting in front of him was born five whole months early.

Percy held up his fingers to count, just to make sure.

"That means…"

Annabeth looked like she was about to cry. Her baby- _their baby_, hugged her neck.

Annabeth nodded, "We should talk."

**I was going to make this a one-shot but now I think I should probably make it a two-shot. Also, for those of you that read or have read my other stories:**

**I'm back! I don't know for how long, though, junior year is kicking my ass**

**I swear I have a bunch of other stories I'm working on but the problem is that there's so many it's hard to focus on completing one in particular. Also, I started some of them like 2 years ago and I don't know when or if I'll finish some of them because I forgot my plans for them.**

**I don't know what's gonna happen with Al Long Way From Home, A Long Way From Rome (ALWFHALWFR). I'm debating on taking it down until I finish it and then reposting it, or just keeping it down if I don't ever finish. But I also know that sometimes it's fun to go back and reread old stories. What do you guys think? Keep it up or take it down?**


	2. Chapter 2

Percy nodded. Yeah. They should talk.

Annabeth looked down and shuffled her feet a bit before looking back up at him.

"I was just going to visit your mother," she told him, "We see her every Wednesday after I pick her up from daycare."

Percy visited his mom Tuesdays and Thursdays after work.

He nodded, "I was just with her."

She nodded. It was awkward.

Percy cleared his throat, "So, uh, Mom knows?"

The elevator dinged. Annabeth looked at the light above it.

"Lets, uh, go back up to your mom's and she can watch Vivi while we, um, discuss things," she suggested.

Percy ducked his head, "Good idea." He held the elevator open for her to step through.

"Can I, uh, help you carry anything?"

Annabeth looked hesitant but slipped the backpack off her shoulders. A sippy cup with a purple narwhal on it and a pink pacifier with pink stars was in one cup holder, a metal water bottle with a green cap in the other. Percy held on to the top strap with one hand, the other in his pocket. He tried to turn his head away from the girls, but he was too entranced by Vivi's grey eyes. They were just so _big_.

Vivi reached a hand up and pushed some hair out of her face.

"Vivi starts wid V, " she told him.

Percy thought he was gonna cry.

"Yeah," he whispered, "it does. Vivi is your name. Your name is Vivi. It means life." His voice was watery and faded in and out.

Vivi nodded like she understood him.

"Yeah," she pointed to her chest, "Vivi."

She pointed at Annabeth's head. Annabeth was staring at him with an expression on her face Percy didn't really have the brain functioning to decipher.

"Dis Mommy," Vivi told him.

He finally turned his eyes to Annabeth and nodded.

"Yeah," he croaked, "That's your mommy."

The elevator dinged and the doors opened. Annabeth turned away from him, walking down the hall to his mother's door. She cleared her throat and knocked.

His mother opened the door and gasped, "There's my grandbaby. How are you m- oh dear." She seemed to have caught sight of Percy and Annabeth standing there together awkwardly.

"Hi Gwamma!"

Vivi was not particularly adept at reading the room.

"Hi, sweetie, why don't you come on in her and play with Auntie Stella and Grandpa?" She looked up at the two adults and said, "I take it you two want to discuss a few things?"

They nodded. Percy was grimacing and Annabeth was biting her lip.

"Thank you, Sally," Annabeth said softly.

"Dank you, Dally!" Vivi repeated.

Sally gave her granddaughter a look, "My name is Grandma."

"Yeah," Vivi said seriously, "Gwamma."

Annabeth set her down and she toddled into the apartment.

"Kitty! Kitty! C'm'mere, Kitty!"

"I think Kitty is in the kitchen, you wanna help Grandma look for her?"

"Uh-huh."

Percy's mother and daughter held each other's hands and walked off to the kitchen.

Annabeth glanced back at Percy and stepped into the apartment, taking off her shoes and walking quietly down the hall. Percy watched before doing the same.

"Just set the diaper bag right here," Annabeth reached over and patted the couch as she placed her purse there as well.

Percy did as he was told.

"Why don't we go to the guest room?"

Percy nodded.

Annabeth nodded.

They started walking. Annabeth pushed the door open and sat crisscrossed on the bed.

Percy sat in a chair off to the side.

They both cleared their throats. It might have been funny if there wasn't so much tension.

"I...um, I…" Percy trailed off.

He let out a frustrated breath and put his head in his hands, scratching his nape.

"I'm sorry, Annabeth. I never should have left. I should have talked to you, I should have faced you like a man, I should have been patient, I should have...I should have…" Percy stopped, the feeling of barbed wire winding around his vocal cords setting in.

Annabeth nodded and put her chin on her fist. "Yeah, you should have, but it's alright, I guess. It was a little easier than I expected, probably because I was preparing for Armageddon. The newborn phase was rough, but we made it. I guess I...well, I never really understood why you left. And so out of the blue, too. Maybe I was disconnected from you or something, but I couldn't really find a reason." She kept her eyes downcast.

Percy nodded, "Yeah, I really should have at least talked to you. I was just...too much of a coward, you know?"

Annabeth smiled wryly and shook her head.

Percy signed.

"What...what made you leave?"

Percy opened his mouth and closed it again.

"I just...didn't wanna hold you back, hold you down, keep you from flying. Didn't want to keep you from being all you could be."

Annabeth was silent for a minute and then shook her head, "That's the shittiest excuse I've ever heard." She got up and started walking to the door.

"Annabeth, wait! That's the truth, that's really the reason!" He grabbed her forearm.

"Bro, you fucking left me with a baby with just a fucking note, there's nothing else you can do to hurt me anymore! If you fucking wanted to leave or fell out of love with me or found someone else or never even loved me in the first place just tell me! What do you have to lose?" She ripped her arm from his grasp.

"Nothing! I have nothing to lose anymore! I'm telling you the truth, I just felt like I was holding you back and that I knew best and that it would all hurt less if I didn't face you! That's it! I was stupid and immature and thought that you would be better without me and everything would hurt for a while and then you would move on and live the life you should have!"

"You don't fucking know what's best for me!"

"I know! I know! I know I don't know what's best for you, that's why I'm so sorry! I'm sorry that you were hurt by my idiotness and I'm sorry that...that you had to do everything alone and that you felt so confused because of me and I'm sorry that Vivi, that Vivi…" they had been almost yelling, but his voice quieted during the second half of his sentence. He tried to calm himself down, regain his breath, more from almost crying than yelling.

Annabeth looked at him with a hard look but nodded, walking back to the bed, this time bringing her knees to her chest and staring at her socked toes.

Percy was still regulating his breath.

"Where'd you go? Your note...it didn't say much."

He looked at her, "Boston."

She nodded. "Vivi and I went down there a couple of times to visit Magnus and Alex and some other family. She liked Boston. Likes the seagulls in the harbor more than all the New York pigeons."

Percy nodded. Vivi liked seagulls. His daughter liked seagulls.

"What, what's she like?"

Annabeth smiled softly, "She's so funny, Percy. She turns up the goof around a stranger. Like, when we go to the grocery store she'll giggle and tell them "Wapunzel, Wapunzel, wet down you haiw!" She really likes star wars. She likes to tie this old tan blanket around her and pretend to be Yoda, and you can't really understand her 'cuz she tries to reverse her sentences like he does and then confuses herself. And she really likes alternative rock, like the stuff Nico and Thalia listen to. She calls it her fighting music. And she's _so _smart, Perce, she knows how to write V for Vivi and an A for Annabeth. She knows how to count to six and on a good day eight. She can sing the whole alphabet. ANd she knows shapes like triangles and circles. And sometimes that stop signs are octagons, even though she usually says they're hexagons, I really don't think that's a particularly pressing matter to correct right now. She _loves_ animals. She has, like, a trillion stuffed animal. Marine animals are her favorite. We have this little Doc McStuffins vet table and she makes _all_ her toys better _at least _three times a day. And literally everything in the shape of a stick is a lightsaber, and she'll try to fight anyone, she's so gutsy. She loves art, too, we draw every day. She loves Peter Pan and Nemo, as well. I tried to limit her screen time for a while because I thought it'd make me a bad mom but as she got older and could do more things like get in trouble I gave up. Making dinner is so much easier when she's preoccupied. Even when a movie is playing, she has this little sandbox full of plastic animals and she'll come in and tell me to say hi and give a kiss to _every single one_. Bath time is her favorite time of the day, she's just like you, if we're at home having a chill day she'll take a bath after _every_ meal, she's the cleanest baby in New York, I swear." By this time Annabeth was smiling fondly and rolling her eyes at the thought of her daughter.

Percy was smiling as well. "Yeah?" He asked through a smile.

Annabeth nodded and leaned back on her elbow, still smiling, "Yeah. When I was getting ready for her, I was never good at science, you know that-"

Percy snorted. "Never good" meant she got a B in every science class ever.

She glared and stuck her tongue out at him, "Anyway, I wasn't really good at science and never understood chemistry like you did, so I always tried to get the organic baby hygiene stuff and organic food so nothing could hurt her, and, you know, be a cool mom, but one day I made the mistake of taking a hungry and grumpy baby into the store with me and she literally screamed like a tea kettle for this blue applesauce that's probably 150% sugar, and ever since she's been an even worse sweet tooth than you. I bet your moms sneaking her cookies right now. Once we spent the night here and your mother volunteered to take her for the morning so I could sleep in and when I woke up she was covered head-to-toe in powdered sugar and zooming across the living room from all the donuts your mom gave her. Oh, and she loves baking, mostly because she gets to make a mess and then eat a sweet treat, but she asks me every day to bake something and I'm like, 'Have you ever seen me bake anything, child?' So she's probably begging your mother to make brownies or something. You know, that was the first solidish food I gave her? The doctor said to start off with bananas or something but I was like 'I know where my baby came from. Give healthy food first and she'll have an aversion to solids forever.' She's stubborn like you, you know. So I gave her the middle of a brownie tray and now she _only_ eats the middle part of brownies, never a corner piece, she's ridiculous. Oh, and the first time I gave her peanut butter, shellfish, and cow milk I did it in the parking lot of a hospital. It was the worst my anxiety has ever been." She laughed and shook her head.

Percy opened his mouth to talk to her but was interrupted by a little girl's voice.

"Mommy?" Vivi's face popped through the door opening. She smiled seeing her mom and staggered in. She had a cookie in her hand. Isabella the fat cat was following her, and Percy's mom was following the cat.

Annabeth pushed herself off her elbow into a sitting position.

"Yeah, baby?"

"Wan' 'ookeh?"

"Nah, I'm okay, thanks though."

Vivi nodded and stuffed the cookie in her mouth. She took it out and pushed it toward Percy, still chewing.

"Wan' 'ookeh?"

Percy watched crumbs fall out of her mouth as she offered him part of her cookie.

"Um, yes, thank you very much," he ripped a part of the cookie off, the opposite end from which she took a bite from.

"Wow, good sharing, Vi," his mom said from the doorway, "You want to come back to the living room and play with your storm troopers?"

Vivi perked up, "Yeah!"

She waddled over to hold her grandmother's hand. Sally mouthed '_sorry'_ to them as they walked out.

Percy laughed a little and shook his head, "I guess you were right about her probably eating something sweet right now."

Annabeth grinned and nodded, a faraway look in her eyes. She leaned back onto her hands.

"Yeah," she snorted, "I have to force veggies down her throat. But she eats fruits a bunch, she loves those, so at least I know my baby won't get scurvy."

They both laughed softly and then settled into an awkward silence. They didn't meet the other's eyes.

"So, uh, you guys seem to have settled in, um, well enough."

Annabeth nodded in a sorrowful way and looked at him.

"Yeah," her breath was a whisper, "Well enough."

Percy felt tears come back to his eyes. He squished his thumb and pointer finger of his left hand over his eyes, dragging them toward his nose and blinking a couple of times.

"I'm sorry," he told her.

She nodded again, the same slow and sad way she did before.

"I know," she dropped her eyes to the ground.

Percy shook his head, "You don't." His voice cracked and the feeling of barbed wire digging into his throat came back.

He shook his head again, more vigorously this time, "You don't know _how fucking sorry_ I am. How much I regret...everything," He put his head in his hands.

"It hurt so bad to leave you. It was the worst pain I've ever felt, like something heavy was sitting on my heart and pushing it down into my stomach and turning my heart numb. There wasn't a day that went by when I didn't think of you. But I always tried to think of you blooming and beautiful. Always tried to think of you kicking ass and redesigning New York's skylines. Sometimes even moving on and being happy. Believing you were better off without me and happy with your life was my only comfort down in Boston. I didn't..I didn't...I didn't _know_. I didn't know how I left you, alone, with a baby.

"God, Annabeth, why didn't you tell me, ask me for...for _money_ or...or...or a _house, _or babysitting or _anything?_ Why didn't you ask me for any _help?"_

Annabeth was looking at him, tears in her eyes and the inside of her cheek in between her teeth.

"I didn't think you wanted anything to do with us," she sat back up, pulling her knees to her chest again.

He shook his head disbelievingly. "Why? How could you think that?"

Annabeth went from sad to furious in a split second.

"How _could _I? How _could _I? How could I _not?_ " She slammed her feet back onto the floor and pushed herself forward, like she was about to stand up, but remained sitting.

"You left out of the blue, a stupid note on the table, cut off all communication, never told me where you were going or who you were going with or _anything. _Want part of that did you expect me to infer meant 'I wanna have a baby with you?' Huh?"

He shook his head at her, "But all those nights! Those nights we spent naming the kids we hadn't had yet, all those daydreams of a house in the suburbs, all those walks on the boardwalk talking about the future!" He stood up, "Hell, we were gonna get married! We were going to grow old together! We were gonna have a life together!"

"A life together! Yeah, and which one of us threw that away because they were pig-headed and thought they knew best? Exactly!" She was almost in his face, despite sitting down.

He sat down, letting the tears flow. Too many things were going on for him to be worried about saving face. He put his head in his hand, his palm against his temple, and his fingers pulling on his hair.

"I know, I know, I know, I messed up. I was supposed to be there, I was supposed to be there to hold your hand when Vivi was born and I was supposed to spend all those sleepless nights awake with you, and I was supposed to be there for her first steps and her first words and, _god._ We were supposed to get _married._ I was supposed to be there _forever_ and I let it all go because I was insecure and stressed and an _idiot_. I'm so sorry, so sorry, I'm so sorry, so sorry," he put his head in his hands, full out crying now.

Annabeth leaned back. She didn't make any move to comfort him, but her face softened.

"Yeah," she nodded, "you were."

They stayed the way for a while, him crying into his hand and pulling on his hair and her sitting on the edge of the bed, chewing her lips, her eyes downcast, thinking.

He calmed down after a while, lifting his head and slumping his whole body against the chair he was in. He was still breathing heavily, and his face was wet, but he was no longer crying, which was an improvement. He sat there like that for a long time, his thumb under his chin and pointer finger over his lips, his elbow resting on the arm of the chair. Annabeth just watched him.

"Where do we go from here?" He said, at last, his voice husky and cracked.

Annabeth shook her head and ran a hand through her hair,

"I don't know, " she let out a humorless laugh.

"You want to be in her life?" She asked after a brief pause.

He nodded and whispered, "More than anything."

"Okay," she whispered back.

Percy's eyes widened, "Really?"

She nodded and smiled a little, presumably at his face, "Yeah."

"Vivi deserves to have her dad around," she continued, "And no matter what goes on between us, or went on between us, she shouldn't have to bear the weight of our- your, mistakes."

Percy nodded. That sounded a lot like a final break up, but he didn't push it. He fucked up, he'd take whatever he could. Plus, there was that ring she had worn on her finger. She probably had someone already. Speaking of the ring, it looked awfully similar to the white-gold pear-shaped aquamarine stone he got her for their engagement. It even had the diamond pave setting. And it was a little loose around her finger just like-

"Is that our engagement ring?"

Annabeth stopped running her fingers through her hair and looked at the ring on her hand.

She looked startled, "I didn't...I just...I.. I mean I...I wasn't expecting to see you today."

She looked like a deer caught in headlights.

"You can take it back if you want, I don't know if you want to, like, sell it or, if you have someone…" she started to take it off until he held up his hand and shook his head.

"Keep it," he instructed her, "It looks beautiful on you."

She nodded and placed the ring back on her finger, the same finger, with the same expression on her face. Percy tried not to read into it too much. She probably just thought it was pretty.

"Um," Annabeth twisted her hands around each other, "What...what are you doing, what's your situation right now? You got a job, a place? You said you went to Boston, when did you get back?"

"Two weeks ago," Percy said while nodding, "And, yeah, Mystic opened up another center further up the Hudson, I'm supervising there. And living a couple of blocks from here, actually."

She nodded in understanding.

"What are your hours like?"

"Most days I'm working the standard 9-5, but I'm technically on call in case of an emergency most of the time. When we open I should start at 7 or 8 and end at 5, but by then the probability that we'll have an emergency is significantly decreased."

She nodded again.

"Every weekday?"

He nodded in response.

"I can technically work from home most days," she started, "But I do have to go in when I'm presenting a design or meeting in-house with a client. And sometimes I go in when I really need to get something done, because she's not a very agreeable coworker," she nodded her head toward the door her daughter just walked out of.

Percy chuckled a bit.

Annabeth pulled her hair back from her face and twisted a few curls in her hair before speaking.

"How about we do something this weekend?" She offered, "We can see how that goes and then plan the next weekend based on that."

Percy nodded and grinned excitedly, "That would be wonderful."

Annabeth smiled back at him, a beautiful, radiant, pearly smile that he had missed so _so much._

The smile suddenly slipped off her face and she opened her mouth, then closed it and bit her lip, her eyes downcast like she was thinking about whether or not to say what she was thinking.

Percy tentatively reached over to hold her hand.

He tried to focus on the topic at hand and not about how soft her skin was or about how long it had been since he touched her.

"I'm...sorry. I know you're her dad and I know you'd never do anything to hurt her or me and I know you're absolutely going to try your hardest to be the best parent ever, and you will be, but I just can't be without her. There are still so many things to teach you, like how to change her diapers and what food she can and cannot eat, and there are so many rules to follow, like her schedule and how often to reapply her sunscreen, and all these things and," she bit her lip, "And a lot of it is me, because I've basically kept a very small but tight circle in her life since she was born and I've never been away from her for longer than 36 hours. Hell, even her playdates are the kids of moms I meet in the mommy-to-be classes I took before she was born. She'll love you, she'll absolutely adore you, I know, it's just scary to introduce someone new to her and it's a lot for me to adjust to, to so quickly change from single-parenting to co-parenting. I'm sorry. I wish I could let you be with your daughter like you deserve but it's just...so hard."

Percy moved to sit beside her on the bed and hesitantly pulled her into a tight hug.

"It's okay, I don't blame you. I messed up and so now I have to deal with the consequences. I'll wait as long as you and Vivi need it. I promise," he said into her hair.

She took deep breaths and rubbed his forearms that were wrapped around her.

Percy tried to regulate his breathing to a normal pattern, but all he ended up with was one that followed her nails as they scratched along his arm.

_In as she stroked from his wrist to his elbow, out as she trailed her hand back down to his wrist._

They stayed like that for a while, breathing in each other's scent. She still used that lemon hair stuff she did two years ago.

She took a deep breath through her mouth and separated from him.

"How about just a walk in central park, and maybe some ice cream?" She proposed.

He smiled and rubbed up and down her arms.

"I love that idea," he told her.

She smiled and pulled her phone from her back pocket, glancing at the time.

"We need to go. We were only supposed to come by and say hi. She needs to get ready for bed and we still live over in Long Island City," she informed him.

Percy nodded and stood up with her.

"Vivi!" Annabeh called, "Time to go, babygirl."

"C'mon, let's go get all our stuff packed up," Percy's mother said from somewhere in Estelle's bedroom.

Vivi toddled after her grandmother into the living room. She struggled to climb onto the couch.

"Oh, Percy, get her, she'll fall," Annabeth instructed and pointed to her daughter.

Percy caught her right as she started to slip. He held her close to his chest as she stretched back toward the couch. He settled down on his knees and let her climb onto the couch, this time with his arms caging her in a semicircle.

Vivi got onto one knee and tried to stand up, but one of her legs gave out and she tumbled into the back cushion of the couch.

Percy gasped and grabbed her, pulling her back to his chest.

"Hey hey!" Vivi cried.

Annabeth laughed from where she was packing up the diaper bag on the other end of the couch.

"She's okay," she reassured Percy, "Sometimes babies fall. It helps build up her leg muscles."

Percy wasn't really convinced, but he placed Vivi back on the couch. She grunted and shoved Percy's hand from her torso.

Annabeth laughed again and Percy smiled.

"That's from your side of the family," Annabeth told him.

Percy scoffed and looked at Annabeth as he started to say something in response but stopped. It was something about the way she said "Your side of the family," like he was a side and she was a side and together they were a whole family.

He looked back at Vivi, who was back to climbing up the back of the couch, her father's hands hovering nearby.

The wonder returned to him. This tiny human really was half Annabeth and half him. Like, they _made_ her. Well, Annabeth did most of the work. Actually, Annabeth did all of the work. He was a biologist, he knew how babies were made, and he really didn't consider the part he played "work."

Still. Vivi had 23 chromosomes from him and 23 chromosomes from Annabeth, one X chromosome from him and one X chromosome from Annabeth, half of her was him and half of her was Annabeth. She was literally a whole other being with _his _flesh and blood, and also Annabeth's flesh and blood, which sounded more creepy than it really was.

Annabeth really was the mother of his child, his baby really did have her eyes. And who knows, maybe he'll have more than just he and Annabeth in her. Maybe she'll have Annabeth's father's speech impediment, or his mother's laugh, or Annabeth's Aunt Natalie's nose.

Vivi's a tiny human full of other humans and potential except she's also her _own _person, and Percy can't wait to meet the person she becomes.

Maybe Annabeth saw his thoughts in her eyes, or maybe he had a funny face on, but she laughed as she watched him struggle to not grab hold of his daughter and hold on to her tightly.

'C'mon, baby, it's time to go home," Annabeth cocked her head toward the front door of the Blofis' apartment.

Vivi swung her head toward her mother. The momentum threw her off balance and she started to fall on her butt.

Thankfully Percy's hovering hands caught her, though he realized that she would have simply fallen onto more couch cushion.

He took her off the couch and set her er on the floor. She wobbled a bit, holding onto his finger for balance. They walked hand in hand (finger in hand?) toward her mother.

Annabeth smiled down at her daughter, "C'mon, my love, we gotta get home before it gets dark," she said as she reached down to hold Vivi's hand.

Vivi let go of Percy's finger to hold on to two of Annabeth's.

"How about Central Park at 10, Saturday, at the water in front of Belvedere Castle?" It was somewhere in between a suggestion and an instruction.

Percy decided that "yes ma'am," was the best answer.

Annabeth smiled a real, satisfied, excited smile, and walked out the door.

Percy blankly stared at the door for a few minutes after they left.

"What…the fuck," he said at last.

His mother laughed from behind him.

**So my original plan was to have this up on April 11th, but on the 8th or 9th I was put in charge of my 3 year-old-niece, whom I love and adore, and who is incredibly difficult to be quarantined with. So plans got pushed back. Then as I was typing this chapter I realized that right about here is where it becomes the same length as the first chapter. I had planned about four other long scenes of Percabeth and Vivi bonding but it just left me with a funky feeling to have such a disparity between chapter lengths. Also, it's been a while since I uploaded, much longer than anticipated.**

**Let me know if you'd like for me to turn this into a three-shot with one more chapter with the scenes of Percabeth reconnecting and Vivi bonding with her daddy. And review! I love them, I live off of them.**


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